It could be seen that the players expected to be soon called around the managing director for instructions connected with motion pictures were taken. So Hugh pulled at the sleeves of Monkey Stallings, to intimate that they had better fall back.
Arthur had already left them. Hugh hardly needed to take a look around to understand what it was that had drawn the other. Yes, he was over there where the man in a business suit seemed to be bathing the limb of a super who had suffered more or less severely when the ladder on which he was mounted had been roughly dislodged from the walls, throwing all upon it to the ground beneath.
If Arthur were given half a chance he would soon be busily engaged assisting the doctor wrap some linen bandages about that bruised limb. By his eager remarks he would also arouse considerable interest on the part of the company's physician, who probably always accompanied the troupe wherever they traveled, as his services were in frequent demand. Indeed, sometimes he became a very busy man.
"I wonder," Billy was saying, becoming more and more audacious, it seemed, on the principle that give one an inch and he will want an ell—-"I wonder now if he'd listen to me if I asked him to let us have a chance to get in the next picture?"
Monkey Stallings laughed harshly at hearing that.
"Well, you are a greeny, Billy, I must say," he declared. "Stop and think for a minute, will you, how silly it would look to see a bunch of Boy Scouts dressed in khaki clothes helping those old-time yeomen tackle the walls of that ancient castle. Why, we'd queer the whole business, that's what!"
"Yes, but didn't you hear him say we'd appear in that last scene?" disputed the eager Billy, loth to give up his ambitious plan to have a leading place in the exposition showing how this famous group of motion-picture players did their perilous work.
"Sure he did," retorted the other, with a shrug of his shoulders as if he pitied Billy's ignorance, "but then you must remember that was intended to show the players resting up between acts, and not at their work. There's a whole lot of difference between the two jobs, let me tell you."
Billy made no reply, but it could be seen that he looked greatly disappointed as he watched the myriad of actors begin to get in position for the opening of the next scene. This might possibly represent the triumphant entry of the assailants into the castle of the enemy, which, in turn, would lead up to the rescue of the lovely heroine just when the villainous knight was about to hurl her into the blazing tower.
The chattering began to die away as the harsh voice of the stage director was heard through his megaphone, giving directions as to how this or that group should carry out their parts. Hugh wondered how many turns it would take before that exacting manager felt like calling it a satisfactory picture. Perhaps they might be forced to repeat the scene many times, simply because some clumsy fellow did something to injure its value.